The real question is, if you have been struggling with an issue for a long time, what is your payoff for staying the way you are?

If I am working with someone who has been sick or overweight for a long time, I like to identify the benefits they are receiving for being the way they are.

No matter how brilliant my exercise, nutrition or healing plan may be, unless I clear your payoffs, you will carry on being sick or overweight.

A payoff can either be conscious or subconscious.

It all stems from the ego, which likes to be juiced up with drama, and therefore is a block in the mental body, even if you are not personally aware of it.

Here are a few common payoffs:

No responsibility. If you are sick, you don’t have to take out the garbage, get a job, earn a living, get up in the morning and be somebody.

Avoid suffering. Somehow you view staying the way you are as a way to avoid the pain of life.

Avoid rejection. You could be choosing to stay overweight in order to avoid being rejected by members of the opposite sex. You can use your excess weight as an excuse to avoid dating.

Get taken care of. This is a biggie. As long as you stay sick, then other people have to make your meals, do the chores around the house or support you financially.

Superiority. You are so important and your issues are so special that no one can heal you. You might have to go to a specialist in another country, for God’s sake, or find someone with multiple initials behind their name because you are so important even your problems can’t be solved with ordinary solutions.

No commitment. You don’t have to commit yourself to an exercise or eating plan. You can just do whatever you please.

Permission. Your illness or excess weight gives you permission to make excuses for yourself. You don’t have to go to the party, wear a bathing suit, work long hours or be accountable to other people.

Sympathy. Another biggie. Being sick or overweight may be the only way you know how to get attention.

Freedom. Being sick, you can finally quit your job and do whatever you want to do.

Stay independent. You don’t have to listen to the experts. You can just keep doing whatever you want to do, eating whatever you like, avoiding taking care of yourself because you would rather self destruct than listen to anybody who actually knew how to make you better.

Dependent on others. You can keep other people at your beck and call because you can’t do it yourself.

Guilt. You can use your illness or excess weight as a way to manipulate other people. They have to come and visit, stay married to you or neglect their own needs because you are so unwell.

Control. Your needs are so specific that you have to control everything about your environment. You decide what goes in the pantry, the temperature of the house, the lighting, the noise level, etc. It’s all about what you need.

Victim/Martyr. Another biggie. You get attention by suffering. You are a victim of other people. You take on everybody’s troubles and woes.

No decisions. You don’t have to make choices because you are simply too tired to think straight.

Not face things. You can’t possibly address the real issues in your life because you are too busy being sick or overweight.

Attention. Even negative attention will do for you.

Manipulation. You use your condition to manipulate other people. You are so unwell their lives have to revolve around meeting your needs.

Security. Because you have an incurable whatever, other people, including even possibly the government’s permanent disability program, have to take care of you for life.

Blame. You are so sick because someone else has hurt you. It’s all their fault. If only they hadn’t been so horrible you could be living a normal life.

Identity. You are your illness. You are a card carrying member of the incurable disease support group and your entire social life revolves around being a member of a sick group of people.

Safety. It’s a lot easier to lie around the house being sick or overweight then it is to go out and take a risk in life.

Avoidance of intimacy. How could you possibly have sex or form a relationship when you feel so bad?

Avoidance of listening. You feel so bad, you just don’t have the energy to listen to other people or care about their issues.

Grow up. Being sick keeps you in a permanent state of infancy. Other people make decisions for you, pay your bills and make long term plans on your behalf.

As painful as it can be to read this list, if you have been sick or overweight for a long period of time, ask yourself what your real payoff is for staying that way.

When I am doing a medical intuitive reading, this is part of what I look for when I am examining the mental body.

When I am working with my clients, I use kinesiology to A) identify their payoffs and B) determine what will actually work to clear the payoffs, which can be deeply ingrained, life-long patterns.

You can use this list anytime there is something you say that you want that you are not actually going after, full steam ahead.

Being honest with yourself is the first step in true healing.

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Thank you so much Janie! Through my 24 years in natural healing, I have observed that unless I empower a client to clear their payoffs for being fat, sick and unhealthy they will recreate disease in another part of their body. I appreciate you reading my blog! Catherine Carrigan